Sagir's heroics go in vain: But what an inning and what a match!

Winning may be rated as the highest pursuit, but generally in competitive sports and particularly in cricket, winning the respect of the opponents despite losing, is equally important. Cricket goes beyond winning and losing. The history is full of team striving to secure a draw or even after the series is settled, the losing team playing for honor.

It is difficult to chose between winning a contest and winning the respect of the opponents. The matter is simple when you can have both. Winning the contest without winning the respect of the opponents is not as satisfying. Similarly, if you gain the respect of the opposition despite losing, the loss becomes more bearable.

Two batsmen and a partnership took the game away from us, when we were sitting comfortable having taken 5 wickets for 90 runs in 20 overs. While Janarden rode clearly on his luck to reach a hundred, as reflected in at least three dropped catches, in Umair's case the luck factor was not that  explicit. I think every bowler from our side knew what to bowl to Umair but somehow it took a little too long to get that one delivery. These two batsmen irrespective of there luck or our lack of that, took the match very far from us. By the time Umair's stumps were undone the damage has been done, and we did well to restrict the opposition to 251 runs.

Rajesh was our standout bowler with very effective support from Raghav. Vijay and Sagir chipped in their share. I had yet another disappointing match. It is time that I have a serious look at my bowling, my team needs more from me than few tidy, wicket-less overs in the first spell. Vijay's gamble of starting our bowling with Adnan seem to work when in his second over he took a wicket. But from then on it was a sharp fall downhill and he finished that successful over with seven wides.

When Janarden and Umair were taking apart our bowling, the situation in the field was very calm. Vijay had a great effect. He kept trying to rotate the bowling, adjust fielding, without any signs of panic in his action and neither did he let the team panic. I think that is what good captains are supposed to bring to the field.

Chasing 252 runs in 40 overs is not easy and we did not start properly. We lost Ratish one of our strong batsman, due to a terrible misunderstanding between Craig and him. It was Craig's call and he was yelling 'no' from the middle of the pitch. Rehan was promoted to bat at number three. We were seeing the effect of a new captain. Rehan reinforced the trust Vijay had shown in him in the best possible manner by scoring quickfire yet sensible 38 runs with four sixes. With him attacking it was a strange sight to have a quite Sagir on the wicket. But Sagir was determined not to be deterred by anything around him. After Rehan wickets fell at regular interval and at one point we were scoring at more than the required run rate but were left with only two wickets and more than 100 runs to score. Some poor calls (Purab and Najib) from the umpire did the damage.

Then started the best part of the match. Rajesh is hardly a batsman to rely on. But what an inning he played. All those improvised shots kept bringing very useful runs and for the first time generated realistic hope to pull off a great victory. When he left we needed 28 runs. I went in, survived a couple of balls and scored four runs. Next over, Sagir who for the first time lost faith in his batting partners, hit a powerful boundary only to be out on the next ball.

The opposition celebrate a well deserved victory. We finally has something to cling on to, despite losing. Admittedly, we did not deserve to win after dropping six catches -- basically everyone who had an opportunity dropped one. In addition, four of our batsmen did not score (Ratish, Vijay, Purab and Adnan). There were three players who deserved a win Sagir, Rajesh and Rehan. Their frustration was obvious.

Those in our team with less experience in playing 40 over matches, must have realized that there is nothing permanent in cricket, one partnership can take the match away irreversibly. However, the match is not over until its actually over and as long as you are on the wicket runs will come and take to closer to the target. Cricket is a team game where individual performances can override the team performance and that is what Sagir, Rajesh from our side and Umair and Janarden from the opposition, demonstrated.

The most important part of the match for us was the character our team displayed. They again reinforced the belief that we do have the ability and we are not just push overs. We may lose a match but we will fight and the opposition has to work extra to take the victory from us.

Everyone who was part of the match will remember it for a long time. Well done Nomads.

right arm over

Arvind